


Starry Night

by Mrs_Colette



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-11
Updated: 2018-12-11
Packaged: 2019-09-16 04:57:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,499
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16947420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mrs_Colette/pseuds/Mrs_Colette
Summary: In a secluded clearing in Belarus, Neville is gathering a rare flower and Natasha is investigating a rash of mysterious attacks. Their paths converge and Neville gets the chance to play hero again, but without the giant snake.Written for the Enchanted Wonders Holiday Fic Collection. I own nothing!





	Starry Night

Neville gathered up his paperwork, glancing at the clock. He had about twenty minutes to get to the clearing, and he wanted to make sure he had everything he needed. It had taken him weeks to get permission to visit the protected area of Wizarding Belarus, and then when his Portkey had finally come through, it was at almost the end of the blooming season for the Epilobium Lemoinei. The plant only bloomed for three weeks, once every fifteen years, and t was near impossible to access at the best of times. As a result, the plant was woefully understudied, making it the perfect choice for his Mastery. The thorns were vital for brewing common antidote, but there had been little opportunity to explore the uses for the pale orange blooms. Neville was attempting to use the delicate blooms as an alternative for Fairy Wings in beautification potions. Hermione had been so delighted to hear of his intentions that she used her pull in the Ministry to get his Portkey secured.

Pulling his knapsack closed, he grabbed the Muggle style down parka Hermione and Ron had given him as an early Yule gift, as his ill-timed excursion would have him missing the get-together the couple co-hosted with Harry and Ginny at Grimmauld Place. A smile touched his lips as he spelled out the lights in the shabby inn room, becoming a tad wistful as he thought of his oldest friends. They had all settled into whatever passed as normal for the Wizarding celebrity couples, and Harry had let slip that he was going to be a father the following summer. Neville had enjoyed his own time in the spotlight, possibly a little more than his friends had expected, but he had been eager to live life to the fullest. He had enjoyed it, but he was ready to move on. This was the final thing he needed to do to complete his Herbology Mastery, and he was anxious about what the next year promised. Shaking his head and reminding himself not to borrow trouble, he waved to the innkeeper and Apparated away.

“Fury, you are aware that sending me on these wild goose chases does nothing to endear me to your cause?” Natasha quipped, adjusting the belt slung low on her hips and shaking her hair out of the knit cap she wore. 

“I didn’t realize you still thought of this in terms of an us versus them sort of thing, Romanoff,” Fury’s deep voice echoed through the earpiece and Natasha cracked a rare smile. 

“At least I get to take the scenic route this time,” she remarked, evading the question, as she began to make her way through the dense woods. “What excuse did the brainiacs give for not letting me use the QuinJet? I can’t believe they’re still mad about Istanbul. You can ask Clint if you don’t believe me, it was an accident.”

“I will not, because we both know that is a lie. It is impossible to ‘accidentally’ land a jet on a trash barge. However, this is because something in the area interferes with the electronics on board. We will be losing connection shortly, I suspect.”

“In that case, let me go ahead and go dark now. I’l set this as my reconnecting waypoint. What’s my timeline?”

“I’ll give you an hour and a half to check things out. We don’t know what is creating the energy surges or turning the locals into vegetables, but you will not engage. Do you copy, Romanoff? Do not play hero today.” Fury barked, his voice short in her ear.

“Loud and clear, Papochka,” Natasha saluted sarcastically, pulling the comms device from her ear while rolling her eyes at the expletives coming through. Nick Fury was not a man for nicknames.

She began to pick her way through the dense woods, pausing to send her GPS coordinates back to S.H.I.E.L.D., making it about a half mile from the waypoint she had established before the interference made the device impossible to read. She could just make out the starlight through the trees, and paused to marvel at the beauty of the cold, silent night. 

Neville made his way into the clearing, his wand at the ready. By his calculation, he had about half an hour, an hour at the most, to collect and place the blooms in stasis while they were fully opened. He would need to move quickly, but he was confident that he would be able to get all that he needed. Humming a Weird Sisters tune, he got out his shears and got to work.

Natasha was bone crushingly bored. She had seen the reports on the disturbances in the area, had agreed that something was happening, but she was sorely regretting agreeing to make the trip-surely this was something one of the recruits could’ve handled? She spotted a clearing ahead, and adjusted her course, jumping slightly as she spotted something out of the corner of her eye. She stilled, senses alert, and took stock of her surroundings. Seeing nothing, she resumed her trek to the clearing. Suddenly, something passed in front of her. It looked like a shadow, but it had more substance, somehow. She remained stone still, tracking it’s movements and realized it was heading for the clearing too. She picked her way through the underbrush silently, following the wraith like creature, barely breathing when she noticed the man in the clearing who appeared to be, gardening?

The hairs on the back of Neville’s neck stood up, and his hand shook slightly, the feeling unmistakable. Dementors. They had been released from service at Azkaban, but he had not given any thought to where they may have ended up. A remote wizarding preserve in Belarus seemed ideal, in hindsight. It would certainly explain all the issues he had getting here. He lowered his shears and reached for his wand, when he heard a woman’s voice.

“Look out!” Natasha called to the gardening man, reaching for her gun. She had just unholstered it when the man yelled back at her, the baritone warm in the cold December air.

“Put that away!” Neville commanded, recognizing the muggle weapon from movie nights. “It won’t have any effect. Get behind me, quickly!” He pulled his wand and cast Lumos Maxima. He caught a quick glimpse of a thin woman, dressed all in black and strikingly beautiful, with an incredulous look on her face.

“Is that a stick?” she asked, a slight russian accent to her words. Her eyes widened and she came to stand back to back with Neville at the realization they were surrounded. “What are these things?” she asked, ascertaining that he was familiar with the creatures hovering around her. She gasped as one got close to her, images of the Red Room flitting across her mind.

The man turned and shot a beam of light out of the stick he held, and the wraith made a hissing noise and reared away from her. Her mind clear, she turned to the broad shouldered stranger who had just come to her aid. 

“Neville,” he said, holding out his left hand somewhat awkwardly, his right hand still gripping his unlikely weapon. “Longbottom.”

Natasha quirked an eyebrow and Neville reddened, which was oddly cute, given the circumstances. 

“Um, that’s my last name, Longbottom. Erm, Neville Longbottom,” he stammered, and she decided to cut the poor guy a break. 

“Natasha,” she replied, allowing her eyes to roam over him. She purposely let her gaze linger on his ass, finally meeting his eyes with a wicked smirk. “And it looks alright to me.” She grasped his hand and shook it as he reddened further. 

“So care to fill me in? What are these things? And why do I suddenly feel like reliving my childhood?”

“These are Dementors, they are creatures that thrive on happiness, and as a result they force us to relive our worst memories. They used to live at Azkaban, but the Ministry must’ve herded them here after the war. With the restrictions they’ve placed on accessing the preserve, they must be starving. Would explain the crowd,” Neville mused, Natasha growing more confused by the minute.

“Azkaban? Ministry? War? I don’t think I’m tracking, Longbottom.”

“We get out of here, I’ll fill you in,” Neville promised, his eyes flitting across the now fully black cloud that seemed to engulf them, now almost blotting out the sky.

“What’s the plan, then?” Natasha asked, rolling her neck to crack it, clearly spoiling for a fight.

“Just stay close to me,” Neville said, lifting his wand.

“One last thing,” Natasha began, Neville turning to her questioningly. “What’s with the stick?”

“Not a stick, a wand,” Neville replied, a positively wicked grin on his face. “Just grab that knapsack and be ready to run.”

Natasha tried to keep the shocked look off her face and did as she as told, listening to what sounded like dozens of bottles rattle around inside. Tightening the straps, she nodded to Neville, ready to get the hell out of there. These Dementors were starting to get to her.

“Expecto Patronum!” Neville cried, rocking back on his heels as a cloud of silvery mist burst from the end of his wand. Natasha watched as the dementors scattered from the mist, almost as if they were afraid of it. 

“Now!” Neville called, reaching back and grabbing Natasha’s hand as he began to run across the clearing. They made it about thirty feet before the mist evaporated, and the Dementors swarmed again, much more aggressively this time. Natasha began to shake as images forced their way across her mind. She could hear Madame B, as clear as day, telling her she was a worthless waste of Soviet resources. Suddenly she heard a man’s voice, calling her name.

“Natasha! Natasha! Can you hear me?!” Neville’s voice broke through her fog, and she stumbled, her emotions swinging wildly. His warm hand found hers again, and she forced herself to look at his face. He looked concerned, and tucked his wand behind his ear to dig something out of his pocket. “Eat this,” he commanded, holding out a foil wrapped packet. 

She took the packet dutifully, looking up in surprise when chocolate was revealed as she peeled back the foil. 

“It helps,” he said shyly, tucking his hair behind his ear as Natasha took a bite. “I’ve never cast a corpreal Patronus before, but my mist isn’t going to cut it this time.” He fiddled with the hem of his parka for a moment before brightening. “Do you have a torch on you?”

“A torch? You mean like a flashlight?” Natasha asked, reaching to the holster on her right hip and revealing a small but intensely powerful beam. 

“Perfect,” Neville breathed, smiling shakily. “I need you to point that upward, just straight up.”

Natasha did as instructed, breathing a little easier as she watched the Dementor’s flee from the beam.

“Great, now turn it off.”

Natasha did, turning a confused gaze to Neville. 

“I don’t want them to realize that it won’t actually hurt them. They prefer dark and dank places, but I would say that their thriving in this environment puts a damper on the theory that they can’t survive elsewhere, no pun intended.”

“So this light won’t hurt them, but your spell will?”

“A patronus is a physical embodiment of happy feelings, without the ability to feel despair, so they have nothing to feed on. It will confuse them and allow us to flee.”

“So it acts like a shield?”

“Exactly. See that star there?” Neville pointed, the single pinpoint brighter than all the others in the sky.

“That’s Arcturus,” Natasha spouted, before mentally damning Clint and his strange obsessions to hell.

“Oh, er, Arcturus, then,” Neville shrugged. “Fix your eyes on it. No matter what else runs through your mind, I want you to focus on nothing but that star. Can you do that?”

Natasha nodded, the feelings of hopelessness already beginning to well up. 

“Ready, set, go!” Neville cried, and Natasha turned on the high powered flashlight, pointing it straight upward. As the the Dementors tried to move away from the light, they began to circle, causing a cyclone like effect as they tried to steer clear of the beam.

“Anytime now, Longbottom!” Natasha yelled, as her head began to swim again, full of the darkest memories. She fought to stay present, focusing on the star, even as the ground began to sway under her feet.

“Trying to think of my happiest memory isn’t exactly easy at the moment!” Neville shot back, clearly frustrated.

“What is your happiest memory?” she asked, pitching her voice to be heard over the wind the Dementor cyclone was generating and trying to focus on the conversation. 

“When I cut the head off a giant snake, killing a piece of a Dark Lord’s soul,” Neville replied, concentrating and attempting the spell again.

“Jesus,” Natasha breathed. “Look at me,” she commanded, and when Neville turned his brown eyes to hers, she leaned in and kissed him, pressing her body to his. Feeling him begin to respond, she pulled back. “Try that.”

Neville stared at her a moment, his eyes hungry. 

“We will be revisiting that,” he said, his voice rich with promise, and quite unexpectedly, Natasha shivered. 

“Well you better get us out of here then, Longbottom.”

Taking a deep breath, Neville squared his shoulders and cried out “EXPECTO PATRONUM!”

A silvery mongoose emerged from the end of Neville’s wand and began to attack the Dementors. Natasha watched, enraptured, as the ghostly creature fought off the wraiths. 

“Natasha!’ Neville called, and she reached for his hand. Just before they began to run, a Dementor slipped between them and suddenly Natasha felt all the happiness she had ever known begin to slip away. She felt so weary, so full of hopefulness as she stared directly into the horrific visage of the Dementor. Neville tugged her hand, just enough to break the connection. Neville pulled her tight to his chest and whispered “hold tight.” The last thing she remembered was the bright light of Arcturus, before a tugging at her navel turned everything black.

One year later…

Making Neville do things the ‘Muggle way’ brought Natasha a little too much joy. Especially on days like today, as she watched him wrestle with the tree. Letting her eyes roam over his body, she picked up the last ornament from the table. Crossing the room, she sunk into his lap, shivering as he nuzzled the back of her neck. Groaning as he nipped her shoulder, she passed him the box. 

“Put this up so I can trim your tree,” she teased, smiling as he opened the box and the crystal star began to throw prisms of light across the room. Neville sent it to its place atop the tree wandlessly, as they got lost in each other and the memories of the night they met.


End file.
